New Zealand Books

Hi our names are samee and liyya, as a child me and my freind liyya read this book as children of 6. AFter that we forgot about this magical book. Now we are 14 and 15 and are over joyed to read this book and retrace our chillhood through this humerous book of limericks and poems. A great read for anyone any AGE!!!

I HAVE REVIEWED THIS BOOK......AND IT DOES ME ALOT OF HELP THROUGH MY ASSIGNMENTS ......IT IS A TRADITIONAL MAORI ARTS WEAVING BOOK AND IRECOMMEND THAT MAORI'S READ THIS BOOK

THANK YOU

Te Wai Pounamu is a beautifully written and comprehensive history of the history of the ngai tahu claim, and as a result, a history of the ngai tahu people from european settlement. The book appears balanced and extremely detailed with more references than you could want, and a huge bibliography. (Not that youd need to refer to any other book after reading this one.) I adored reading it and constantly refer back to it. Anyone interested in Maori, in Ngai Tahu, or in indigenous histories should enjoy it.

The Team

The late Ian McNeill's authoritative account of the Australian Army Training Team in Vietnam is now a classic. It is rare to read a book that drips courage and resourcefulness from every page. Australia, like most countries, employs myth makers to tell stories that reinforce national stereotypes. This book peels back the hyperbole that often surrounds really brave soldiers and in un-emotive language lets the deeds tell the stories.

A key problem for Australian troops operating in Vietnam was the lack of compatibility between the Australian jungle training emphasis on patrolling and ambushing, and the American pursuit of large unit engagements. This was a false dichotomy because the nature of guerrilla warfare is not one or the other, but both. McNeill addressed this issue and showed how both armies worked with the Vietnamese relatively successfully.

Army advisers, whether American or Australian were marked men and the Communist forces tried hard to kill them because of their ability to rally troops and call for air-strikes and medevacs. Often the only Western troops with indigenous units, the Australian and American advisers formed agreements that they would not leave each other behind. Some of the most heroic acts in the war occurred when the advisers tried to rescue each other in battle. A story that is truly moving is that of Dasher Wheatley who tried valiantly to rescue the wounded WO Swanton and rather than leave him to the advancing enemy, Wheatley stayed with his mate and they were both killed. Among soldiers, Wheatley's action epitomised the Australian digger tradition and he was awarded a Victoria Cross, the first awarded since WW2.

I remain in awe of those brave men (The Expendables) who served from the DMZ to the Delta.

This book is now a definitive classic that will appeal not only to the cognoscenti but also readers who are really interested in irregular warfare and the role of special forces. The problem will remain for prospective readers that copies of this book are as scarce as hens' teeth, but it is worth the effort.

I bought this book for my husband last summer when we had a fantastic trip through beatiful New Zealand.

He enjoyed it so much he passed it on to me. Much to my surprise (and delight!) there's not a lot of golf in it.

Okay, so he plays the odd game but it's really about the adventures New Zealander Justin Brown has as he travels around the US meeting strange folk. My fav. chapter would have to be the clown wedding in Richmond closely followed by Miss Iva, the 91 year old (young!) beach queen from Tybee Island.

I was glad to see the wonderful hospitality we received in New Zealand was recipricated for Justin.

If you just want to sit back and have a laugh I throughly recommend this book. It's funny, crazy and off the wall.

Ernestine Hill visited Australia's Northern Territory in the 1940s and her text from those years is still of significant value today. Whether the old characters she met in those days are gone or not (they are not all gone - it's still possible to find some of them out in the mulga), the stories she tells about them and this extraordinary land are still worth reading, perhaps more than ever. The Territory is still off the beaten track (except perhaps for Darwin and Kakadu) and the colour you get from a book written forty or fifty years ago is still vivid and impressive. At the time she wrote it (if memory serves me, she was a journalist working in Sydney or Melbourne, who was taking time off to travel Australia), the outback was still extremely remote and unknown even to most Australians. She was criticised by some of the people she wrote about, as having no idea what the place "was really like" and for being "a Southerner" who knew nothing about the north. Yet I for one, who lived for four years in the Top End, appreciated her text very much and I think we can be extremely happy today that she managed to get it published. It will take you back to a world, much of which is gone forever. Yet if you get the chance to stop a bit in the north, you'll be surprised what you find, and Hill's book might just put you on the trail of discovery.

Ernestine Hill wrote a number of books about northern Australia, one other of which I've read. "Australian Frontier" is her story of a trip around the coast from Perth to Darwin in the 40s and it is also well worth reading. In particular she tells some stories of the pearling days in Broome and Darwin, which are worth having a look at. I just hope books like these won't remain out of print forever.

This was a very interesting book, written by an Australian, giving us an idea of what it felt like when the Americans came to Australia.

It's an unvarnished account, taking General Douglas MacArthur to task for being a prima donna -- leaving his men to fight to the death or be captured and face the Bataan Death March. In an interesting touch, the author uses popular song titles of the era for his chapter headings. The one for MacArthur is very appropriate: "Too Marvelous for Words."

The cultural differences between the Australians and the Americans is, at first, something that both sides can learn from. After a time,it becomes apparent that the Americans are better paid and more popular with the Australian women, and skirmishes begin to break out. Then, a full-scale riot happens (The Battle of Brisbane). It takes some time before things calm down, but Australia was changed forever by the presence of the Americans.

There are accounts of the different services, and how they performed in battle. I was glad to see the U.S. submarine force received an entire chapter, and even more surprised to find that one of the boats that my father served on in the Korean War was active in the fleet off Australia (I knew they had been in the Pacific, but had not known it had been that far south!).

In all, a good read, and the only book that I've ever found on this subject.

Paul Monin writes few books, but they are all efficient and readable histories of the area he lives in. His history of Waiheke Island and area is one of the classic works. In this book he is very able to delve further into the history and culture of the area, the Hauraki Gulf.

His introduction points out the limitations to which he is dealing with. Firstly as a Pakeha (white) author and secondly the fact that he has not made use of the Te Reo sources, leaving that for, perhaps, a different author to use.

He chose his time span, 1769-1875 which covers the period from Cook's first sighting of New Zealand and through the Maori Wars. It includes Auckland's brief stint as the Capital of New Zealand. As it says in the blurb, this is the story of a vigorous Maori economy which during this period relentlessly transferred the wealth (usually by force or sleight of hand) to the settlers.

this has been re-released this year as simply Hauraki Contetsed, 1769-1875

I would highly recommend this to other Kiwis, especially Aucklanders, it is a highly approachable and readable account which will, I think, give you a clearer perspective of the Waitangi Tribunal and its role. Certainly if not that, it will give you a stronger sense of history.

Marilyn Waring is a political scientist who served three terms (1975-84) in Parliament in New Zealand and then turned to farming. This book follows her If Women Counted: A New Feminist Economics by about eight years. Waring's essays on POLITICS and HUMAN RIGHTS in Three Masquerades are absorbing, but what blew me away was her essay on WORK, which begins with Waring taking buckets of manure to friends for Christmas, because she has nothing else to give. It proceeds rapidly to a summary of her earlier work on the UN System of National Accounts and the policy implications of its "production boundaries" (alone worth the price of the book), goes on to describe attempts by international labor and other organizations to expand the ways in which value is assigned to work, and finally (the unmasking) comes up against old-fashioned impermeable barriers of hypocricy and sexism. Three Masquerades includes four useful appendices: three international covenants concerning human rights, and an appendix on the structure of the United Nations.

This hardcover book is beautiful - full of magnificent photographs of the New Zealand countryside, horses, people and hounds. The text is easy to read yet informative. It is a book to grace the coffee tables of hunting enthusiasts throughout the world.